Month: November 2016

Day 17: We were going to rock Thanksgiving weekend with work. Not realizing everything we could do on Thanksgiving day required us to have something else done that we had to go get parts for. So we worked for a couple hours then ate the Thanksgiving meal I had prepped while working too and relaxed watching movies and catching up on ideas. (We looked at Black Friday sales flyers too)

Theater Screen WallHalf WallsMore HalfwallsOur Heater

Day 18: Black Friday: If they had anything we needed on sale, we did not see it! We went in got what we needed for plumbing and left – FOUR TIMES! We then spent a couple hours with the grey water lines: dry fitting it, gluing it and being done with it. We also did all of the water lines with pex (flex plumbing and push fittings – best plumbing out there!!)

Washer HookupsThe Inner Workings/ Behind the Scenes Plumbing

Yep look at that saw dust I need to get out of there before closing up….

Shower Hooked UpSink plumbedThe Outer workings of the Plumbing

Day 19: We installed 2 ceiling fans and 2 exhaust fans. We also finished the hook ups on the plumbing lines. All told a couple hours of work!

Kitchen Ceiling FanKitchen ExhaustFamily Area FanBathroom Exhaust

We have to replace the LED lights – the one set we got were faulty and they have sent us a refund and we had to order a new set. We have received and installed voltage meters for the battery inverter side, in order to not over power everything. We have a new larger solar power controller on order in order to ensure that we do not overpower and blow out the 30w one (please note that our first system will be used on our van)

We have to run the gas lines next and finish the power to the batteries – This way we can get our new solar panels and batteries ordered. We are digging deep to get the $3000 – yep $3000 to not have to have a power bill or be connected to anything – This will give us 1KWh of power solar panels and 1000ah of batteries, giving us MORE than enough to do the house daily with regular ‘luxuries’. We also are digging in to get the $1600 for the composting toilet ($1000 with solar ‘burn’ so you only remove ash once a month) and to get the water recycle/capture system set up in order to just recycle our grey and capture rain water and filter all of it. We are looking to be totally self sufficient. These are the items that are not necessary for a regular house to be connected to the grid.

However, these items are:

Connecting to the power grid: $5000 + $75 a month basic

Connecting to water and sewer in a new location: $5800 + $50 a month basic.

These costs are upfront fee and then monthly fee for as long as you are turned on and the hook up fee is non refundable!

For us the cost efficiency is there. We are willing to put more work in to go green and being more mobile in the long run.

We got the solar and 12v lights hooked up, we are waiting on our 12v ceiling fans. This will eliminate any extra fans we might need in Tiny. The idea for us is to run as much as we can off of the sun. We currently have on order 600ah batteries and 500w of solar panels. This will add to the 100w solar we have and the 80ah batteries we have already.

We will evaluate and then purchase more batteries or panels as needed. However, we will probably not need any more of either since we are using low wattage everything and higher wattage items such as refrigerator or stove will be propane. Our coffee pot is a perk (top of stove). Even our washer runs on 6a – very low power usage!

Well, we worked on Tiny for one day of this last weekend. It is getting harder and harder to work on her for long periods of time since our daylight has gotten shorter for winter.

Today (Well Sunday): We got the wood for the walls, the paint, the water heater, the front cabinet, the solar inverter and built the front cabinet for her. The front cabinet on her will hold the water heater, the solar batteries, the electrical panel, the inverter, the exchange panel, the propane, small outdoor tools and water tank. It will in the end also give us some aero dynamics with the shape.

On Demand Hot Water HeaterFront Utility Cabinet Framed in.Wood for the WallsPaint Colors and Accessories.

However, we had to spend the other day of our weekend winterizing everything else… oil changes, tires, mufflers, power washing and sealing. So we lost an entire day with maintaining everything else. I will update again on day 15 of work.

Day 12 we completed the wall studs and ceiling/closet floor, the bathroom door build and the electrical for tiny (not including the installation of the lighting.) We do however have plugins that work inside her now! We also drew out and started placement of the externally attached storage for the propane tanks and electrical units we will need to make sure that tiny is self sufficient.

Day 12 – Installed the Stud walls for the bathroom and built the bathroom door for the barn door track we have to install.

Shower WallBathroom StudsBathroom Studs with Door

Day 13 – Installed all the plugins and placed the light switches. Ran the lines and Tested. Tiny is running on her own.

Living & Bedroom Walls of Electrics Installed and WorkingKitchen Wall Electrics Installed and WorkingBack Up Generator

Hubby went back to work the day after coming back from Vacation. Work has slowed up. We are officially on Day 11 of our build but we are physically 3 months into it. After this next post I will be going back to day to day posting. I feel bad that I did such a great job on the last blog and I have rushed to put this one back together.

DAY 6 – All the exterior wood was put into place so we could reseal it and start on the window and door placement. * realize that we were stopped midstream due to rain also.

Our first through fifth days were right before we went on vacation. Attached are the photos of the build. At the end of the build I will give an entire materials list of what we used and a basic run down of cost on this build. This is our first tiny build but not our last.

We had sat down and decided to build Tiny. She is an 8 1/2 x 16ft car hauling trailer. We decided to make the transformation and researched how easy/hard/long/tedious she would be to create a masterpiece that we would live in. We have our ups and downs with designs and placements. We have had our moments of clarity on what will and wont work so far. Also, we have made changes and modified as we have been going along.

Our first motivator was the following:

We have been working with a great program to do the layout called: sweethome3d.com The download was free and it is easy to work with. Or you can work with it online.

Knowing that federal regulations require the height of a ‘camper’. tiny home or anything being less than 13′ tall and less than 8’6″ wide, our specs were then drawn up. We made a cushion in our height and width both. This made our inner dimensions 90″ wide and 10feet tall (not including the extra 6 inches in the center ‘vault’ that we gained.)

We have had several attempts before we got the layout the way we were both happy. We also made sure we used durable materials that were not ‘heavy’ so far.

Our layout is basically as shown below with our under loft (only under the loft) height being 6’4″ Our living room area (4 ft x 7’6″ ft is a full 10 ft) our loft area where our bed is 42″ at the edge and 48″ in the center. our kitchen height is 8’6″ (since we put a 18 inch storage riser under it) our bathroom is a 6″ step down from the kitchen and 6’2″ tall, this makes our closet/storage above the bathroom to be 36″ at the edge and 40″ at the edge. giving us a great amount of storage area for our pair down of clothes we have. Our basic layout is seen below.

Please note this is a summary of my last blog. I lost the blog in a website move in order to give me more for longer.

Family Home

Before thinking of going tiny. We were both in very large, very possession oriented places in our lives. We met and realized there is so much more to do that just work for things. We both love to travel and do things. So, first thing was to get rid of our 1790 sq ft home and move to better climate where we would be able to do what we wanted to do more often. So we got our house ready and got rid of it. I have all of the photos available for this house transformation that we did. Everything from new plumbing to new floors. We absolutely loved and hated the process.

We bought property on the Gulf in Mobile AL so we could then build a cabin resort with bar and grill on it… 5 years ago. We then knew without being here to work on it we would never get it done. Hence, buying the house we have just finished, Mobile AL.

Fishing CabinBeginning to Middle

Fast forward 5 years. We have started building Tiny to move to our property. We are making Tiny self sustaining so we can take her anywhere we want to go.

I will go through Day 1 to Day 11 of the build rather quickly So I can get recaught up on the building of Tiny.